


Jared

by Moths_Spiders_Books



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Body Horror, Eating Disorders, Gen, MA civilian fic, Non-Consensual Body Modification
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-24
Updated: 2017-04-24
Packaged: 2018-10-23 14:45:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10721403
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Moths_Spiders_Books/pseuds/Moths_Spiders_Books
Summary: A young woman describes her encounters with Jared Hopworth. Not given as a statement.





	Jared

**Author's Note:**

> Right, this is the first fanfic I've shifted over from my tumblr. To those who don't know what "civilian fic" is, it's a term I use to describe the fanfic I write that involves characters who are on the periphery or not actively involved in the actual statements, but who still have encounters with MA characters.

We met at a party. It wasn’t a good party. There had started to be more bad parties than good ones. Maybe they were only bad because I’ve stopped with the...you know. The everything. I stopped before I met Jared. Perhaps that was why I caught his eye. Everyone else was on something. I was trying to cling to the life and friends I had after making my big decision, and Jared obviously had his own stuff going on. But he was there, and I was there, and that was how we met. 

He was a striking guy. Tall - at least 6’7 - so he had to stoop to get through all the doors and when he sat down next to me his legs almost touched the opposite wall. It wasn’t a big flat, but it was still pretty weird. His legs should have been shorter. He was all out of proportion. I didn’t worry too much about that, not really. I never mentioned it - I figured it might have been something he was self conscious about. Striking’s just a nice way of saying weird looking, isn’t it? I wasn’t much of a picture myself, not after two years of bad stuff and not eating.

I don’t remember what we talked about. Movies, probably. Jared was a big fan of a certain sort of movie; the sort where people get locked into traps which they have to escape by chewing off their own arm or whatever. We watched a lot of those movies after we started hanging out. He liked me to rest my feet on his lap, and he’d rub my feet with his awful hands. He wasn’t being gross about it. Every time I’d twitch my feet his huge thumbs would rub at my ankle bones. Like he was fascinated by how they moved under my skin. 

I was quite skinny then. It was wonderful - imagine how it feels to be able to count your ribs even without lifting your arms. My collar bones always sharp looking, my spine visible. I know some people found it gross - only dogs like bones, right? Jared liked my bones, though. He laughed when I told him that. He wasn’t gross, like I said. What’s that word? Aesthetic. He looked at me like I was some fascinating sculpture or something. I think that it was the only reason he kept me around. But I was so lonely then it didn’t matter. At least someone wanted me, even if he was some bone obsessed weirdo. Maybe I’m not being fair. He was nice. 

On the first night we met we talked for a while. He suddenly mentioned he had this book he thought I’d like. Just out of the blue. I told him I was dyslexic. He seemed disappointed but maybe a bit relieved as well? Anyway, we talked a bit more. He had his hoodie pulled up, so I never really got a good look at his face. After that bit about the book he said something about his Mum dying. I don’t know what I was thinking but I grabbed his hand and held it. It was lumpy and hard, like there were too many bones. He startet but squeezed mine back. It hurt. He didnt’t let go, not until we were kicked out when our host wanted to go to sleep. I volunteered to do the dishes, but a house full of people facing hangovers and bad trips weren’t too worried about how tidy their house was.

Before I left Jared turned to me and said something about how I was nice, how I wasn’t like other girls, and asked for my number. It’s always a good feeling to be told you’re special, especially when people have been talking about how boring you’ve gotten all of a sudden. Molly told me recently that when a guy says that he’s really saying “I’m not going to treat you as bad as I treat the other girls” but I think Jared meant it. Probably because I didn’t freak out about his weird bone disease or whatever it was. 

Jared didn’t talk much but I could tell he appreciated someone hanging out with him all the time. He wasn’t into me, not in the romantic sense. He was weirdly protective though. Didn’t like me hanging out with my old crowd, so instead of going to parties we’d stay at his place, watching those awful movies. I felt so safe around him that I would sleep on his couch. He lived alone so handsy flatmates weren’t a problem.

He never had any food in his house. I thought there’d be loads, given that he was such a big guy. But the cupboards and fridge were empty. There wasn’t ever food wrappers in the rubbish. I was probably the worst I’d ever been then with my eating and food so it wasn’t too much of an issue. The only time it was an issue was when I got into my head that he might want a milkshake from Maccas so I bought him one.   
I never really looked at his face if I could help it but he was so angry when I walked through the door.   
“It’s not for you, is it?”  
I felt cold all over.  
“No, it’s for you.”  
“Good, ‘cause you know those things will make you fat, right?”  
That was enough to put me off anything dairy for a while, right up until I fainted on the tube and had to be taken to hospital. The way he said it - he wasn’t angry. He sounded betrayed. Like I’d get fat just to hurt him. Pretty sure he just threw the milkshake down the drain anyway. 

I was in hospital for a while after that. My brother Noah managed to track me down and cried on my bed for two hours, begging me to get help. I eventually agreed, just to shut him up. We’re not well off enough to use one of those fancy rehab places so Molly just got a self help book off Amazon and read it cover to cover. Meal plans and family discussions around the dinner table. I could see the flesh starting to cover me again, creeping like soft mould across my ribs and my hip bones, my stomach starting to get doughy and round. 

I called Jared in tears. We hadn’t spoken in months because my phone had disappeared when I was staying with Molly and Noah. He let me come over, said he was looking forward to it. Jared never felt sorry for me. He was hard to read, with his face being the way that it was but I knew he’d never pity me. 

He seemed taller when he opened the door. Maybe his disease was getting worse. He noticed the weight gain immediately - reached out with those twisted fingers and squeezed my hip like he was testing a pillow. That’s how I felt. Overstuffed. I told him I was planning to lose weight.  
“Good,” he said. “Don’t let them do this to you. You’re prettier how you were before.”

His flat was always a bit gross but it was even worse now. It looked like he’d ripped the top of the doorways out and knocked through walls, so the inside of the house looked skeletal and weird. All the wiring and pipes were exposed. The staircase was gone, leaving just a hole in the ceiling. Mattresses and blankets covered the floor next to the TV. 

We watched one of those movies again. A new one. He gave me some white pills and I swallowed them dry, my throat burning. Under his hoodie his shoulders and back looked even more lumpy and swollen. HThis time he didn’t touch me at all. We just sat there. And then Jared started laughing. There wasn’t anything funny happening in the movie - not at all, someone was getting their arms broken - but he sat there laughing as if it was the funniest thing he’d ever seen. I wrapped myself in a smelly blanket and curled up, wishing I’d stayed with Molly and Noah.

I had a dream that night. Or a nightmare. Must have been those pills he gave me. I dreamed that Jared reached inside me with his fingers, right through my skin. Then he pulled one of my ribs right out of me. It hurt more than anything. Dream Jared asked me if I was watching and I was, lying on my back as he twisted the bone into a little heart shape.   
“Better make it even,” Dream Me said.   
He laughed again. Then he pulled another rib out, this time twisting it into a ring shape and wrapping it around his finger, as if it was soft as clay. It hurt, of course. I can’t even say how much, or describe how. I remembered the trick that Noah taught me to escape nightmares - count down from a hundred to zero, and Dream Me did, while Dream Jared laughed and laughed. 

I opened my eyes and it was morning. A grey morning, but morning. Jared was propped up against the wall, long legs stretched out.   
“Sounded like you were having nightmares,” he said.  
“Yeah.”  
“You shouldn’t come around anymore,” he said. He wasn’t looking at me. “I’ve got a new job. Not good hours for hanging out.”  
I didn’t want to ask. Jared was a big guy, and the people we used to hang out with weren’t criminals but knew people mixed up in that stuff. Jared probably couldn’t get normal work, not looking the way he did. I couldn’t blame him and I wasn’t going to argue with him about it. Not after last night, him laughing while the person on the tv screamed and screamed as their arms snapped . And that awful nightmare.

I didn’t say anything, just got my stuff. I did kiss him on the cheek though. Not sure why. He never liked being touched. Maybe to show him there were no hard feelings, even though we’d never done anything. We weren’t even friends.

Anyway, people say I’m doing a lot better now. Molly and Noah and I moved to Canada since Molly’s folks own a tourist lodge there. It’s a long way away from the city, so I’m finishing college through correspondence. I help out in the kitchen and Molly’s Dad is teaching me how to ski. It’s funny - I broke my arm and it didn’t hurt as much as that dream with Jared pulling my ribs out. The whole thing with Jared seems weird. I’m not even sure it did happen the way I remember, even the boring stuff. I looked for all those movies we used to watch on IMDB and they don’t exist. Not that it’s a bad thing - I can’t imagine people even pretending to do those things to each other. Who even thinks of those things? How could he laugh?  
I haven’t told anyone else about Jared and I’m not going to. I’m trying to put all of that stuff behind me. Sometimes it’s hard with the nightmares - sometimes I dream that I’m walking through the snow and see massive footprints - and Jared comes out from the trees and he’s angry and he grabs my arms and begins to twist them. But the bones don’t break - they just twist like clay. Then I remember to count down from one hundred and wake up. Molly’s Mum’s cooking has made me put on weight - probably enough that he wouldn’t recognise me. I always felt like he was only ever looking at my bones anyway.


End file.
